Wednesday, June 26, 2013

OK folks, I might as well say this right up front: This is not going to be one of those warm and fuzzy posts. It's not intended to make you think, make you cry, or make you laugh. On the jibber- jabber scale, it doesn't even rise to the level of a yakabout.

This is what might be called a blog irk. I'm only writing it because I'm hot and irritated and probably a little hormonal, and it seemed like a healthy alternative to heading to Baskin Robbins.

Do you know what I've been doing for the past week?

I have been on the hunt for some vintage dining room chairs.

Actually, I've been on this hunt for about two years now, ever since I refinished the rest of the furniture in my dining room. I've been looking in earnest for the past week because I earnestly want to buy them.

As in, now.

You see, all year, we squirrel away cash to use on our anniversary. We keep it in this little coffee can we call The Untouchable.

(We learned to do that the hard way, through too many years of famine.)

Since this was our 29th anniversary, and the traditional gift for that year is furniture, we decided to do something different. We decided to add our Untouchables to the "chair fund" that I've also been squirreling away and buy those dining room chairs.

Woooohoooooo, right?

Yeah, well, it wasn't that easy.

We spent the night in Savannah and got up raring to go on Monday morning. We hit every conceivable store in the city, and then we headed home, stopping at vintage stores and malls along the way.

Did we find vintage dining room chairs?

Well, yes, we found them. The problem was that every set of chairs in the style we liked had already been subdivided and painted into colorful pieces of occasional whimsy.

Oh sure, there were still some complete sets out there. Had we been looking for sky blue chalk paint with chevron print cushions, we could have found it. Fuddy Duddies that we are, we weren't looking for that. We were looking for simple red mahogany chairs...the kind that stand the test of time.

Those, we could not find, and that's why I'm irked this morning.

In fact, I'm just a little irked at the whole overdose of painted furniture out there in general. Yes, I realize this is not going to be a popular opinion in blogville, but it's my opinion nonetheless.

Not long ago, the painted pieces would catch my eye in the vintage booths. They stood out as different and creative. Now, it's a chalk painted jungle out there. Honestly, in all my years of trend watching and fad following, I have never seen anything go gangbusters like the current painted furniture craze.

That's what it is, after all, a craze. It erupted way too quickly to be anything else. When something consumes the market the way painted furniture has, what you have is neither a style nor a trend.
It. is. a. craze.

That's not to say that I dislike it. I don't. I actually like the look of it. I admire the artisans and bloggers who have made paint techniques so popular. I have some pieces I'm planning to paint here at my own home.

It's nothing new, after all. We had a lot of painted furniture in my home growing up.

I realize there are many twenty- somethings out there who do not know this, but your grandmothers already did the paint technique thing. They did it back in the '70s, during the last recession; They called it antiquing... a little paint followed by swipes of darker glazing.

Raise your hand if you remember...

I have no problem with that. In fact, had it not been for the antiquing fad of the '70s, I would never have learned to refinish furniture in the '80s. (Something tells me I'm going to be very busy about ten years from now, too...)

My problem isn't with the painting. It's with the gobbling. Because they are willing to paint just about anything, just about everything is getting painted.

Faster than you can blink. .

And folks, not everything ought to be painted. Not everything increases in value with a coat of paint. In fact, sometimes just the opposite is true. I wish Generation Paint would slow down for a pair of minutes. I wish they would leave a few untouchables in their original glory.

Save the whimsy for that mid-century modern blonde veneer. Turn that dark '70s pine into something colorful and cottagey. Do whatever you want to '80s oak... I have plenty to sell you if you want it. But please... please... could you leave the Chippendale alone?

According to those experts on all things holiday, no research as been able to determine exactly whostarted this very pink holiday, exactly whyit was started, and exactlywhen. All they know is that regardless of the day of the week upon which it falls, National Pink Day is always celebrated on June 23rd.

Now, the rest of you may have your own opinions and theories,

but this morning, I would like to present mine.

On this day, June 23rd, 1984...

I report. You decide.

Of all the gifts that God has given me,this guy is my second favorite.

Two are better than one, because they have good return for their labor. If either of them falls down, the other can help him up. Pity anyone who falls and has no one to help him. If two lie down together, they will keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend. A cord of three stands, it is not easily broken. ~Ecclesiastes 4:9-12

Ok, maybe hate is too strong a word. I hate liver. Summer, on the other hand, is more like a green bean. I can stomach it, but I don't enjoy it. I just endure it until it's off my plate.

That's because I live in south Georgia. Do you know what summer looks like in south Georgia?

This.

With regularity.

As a younger woman, it didn't bother me. I was a school teacher after all. Summer meant two things: time off and tan on. (I was all about the suntan back in the day, and I have the wrinkles to prove it.) As a young mother, I enjoyed it even more. Summer meant adventures with the girls and lazy days by the pool. Yeah, summer was pretty cool back then.

Nowadays, it's just hot.

Nowadays, I look at the date on the calendar and the temperature on the thermometer and snort.

Here we go again...

Last summer, I tried to *fix it* by creating a Sand Pail List of activities to do while the heat was on. It was a pretty fun idea and worked well until the unfortunate debit card incident turned into No Buy July.

So here's the thing: While I was planning to do the whole Sand Pail List again, I have changed my mind. I'm fickle like that. You see, as I made that list, I started thinking.

I'm always thinking.

Was there a single adventure on that list that couldn't be done, and more pleasantly so, in the fall?

Why no, there wasn't.

I'm not teaching anymore, and the nest is empty. I have just as much time for adventure in the fall as I do in the summer, and I can do it all without sweat stains. If orange can be the new pink, and 50 can be the new 30, why can't autumn be the new summer?

I think I'm onto something here.

So this morning, I decided to dump the sand pail and leave summer fun to families with full nests. This year, I'm going to give myself permission to stay inside where the living is easy, and the temperature is a sweet 78.

I won't be taking on any huge indoor projects, either. This summer, I'm going to sweat the small stuff and work on all those little projects and crafts that have been banished to the back burner in the name of grand schemes.

True, it doesn't sound as fun as picking Georgia peaches or going on a riverboat ride, but it's still an adventure if you give it a name. That's the rule. I know because I made it up.

I'm calling it Sweat the Small Stuff Summer,
and the adventure begins today.

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Folks, I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but there is a whole new form of pack- rattery of which to beware. It's even more insidious that the usual kind because it takes up very little physical space. It's called e-hoarding, and apparently I have fallen victim to it. In fact, I'm nearly positive that it was e-hoarding, and not just old age and fickle fingers, that ailed Della the Demon Possessed Laptop.

I discovered it much the same way that one discovers any hoarding: I opened the door.

It all started Friday evening when the Man of the Place came home, plugged in new Dellie, and asked an innocent question:

Do you want me to save things from your old computer onto the new one?

Why, yes I did.

I had photos on there for one thing. I need my photos. And no, I didn't want to save them to a thumb drive at that moment. At that moment, I just wanted to get the new Dellie up and running. He accommodated me and began to save them.

It took 11 hours and 30 minutes.

No lie.

I took this pictorial evidence about two hours into the project.

Apparently, it takes that long to save over 17,000 photographs.

Oh, how I wish I were exaggerating like usual, but I'm not. I really and truly have that many photos. (And I wonder why I go through one shiny red Kodak a year...)

Technology has made it entirely too easy to point, click, upload... and save.

If the photos were my only problem, it would be bad enough, but they weren't. I have three email accounts full of un-deleted old messages as well.

And then, I have the bookmarks.
Oy...

I have both Internet Explorer and Google Chrome, you see, and between the two of them, I had roughly two million bookmarks. (OK, that part might be a tad exaggerated, but I still have hundreds... at least.) They're all organized of course. I have them secreted away in tidy little folders.

As I said in THIS POST last summer, however, that's not really organization.

It's storganization, and it's still hoarding.

I have folders for bill paying and folders for Bible study... folders for current events and folders for genealogical research...folders for teaching and folders for speaking... folders for decorating and folders for crafts. Folders for recipes...

I started those recipe folders before the days of Pinterest. (Another e-hoarding nightmare waiting to happen.). Most of them have never even been tried, like Dr. Oz's Cherry Pork Chops. I like cherries, and I like pork chops, but I'm not sure I would like them together, and I'm not even fond of Dr. Oz.

But there they were, storganized on the computer between my recipe for German chocolate cake and a misfiled youtube of Ronnie Milsap singing, "What a Difference You've Made In My Life".

The Practical One has a name for this. She calls it Crazy Pants. Folks,I stand here today in my crazy pants to make this full confession: Hi. I'm Debbie, and I'm an e-hoarder.
There. It felt good to get it all out in the open.

Since I spent last summer dealing with my physical storganization problem, I'm dubbing the summer of 2013 as the summer I face down cyber storganization and live to tell the tale.

I started purging yesterday, and like the true over achiever that I am, I spent wasted an entire day plunked in front of the computer(s) trying to tackle the problem. We hoarders aren't really known for our moderation. What we are known for is a tendency to hippity hop down rabbit trails whenever we start looking at our schtuff. Clearly, I need a better plan.

That's why I'm asking you to Talk Back this Tuesday.

Are you an e-hoarder, or do you have a firm grip on your computer storage?

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

She showed up yesterday afternoon, and I'm pretty excited about it. Unfortunately, the Man of the House will not show up until Friday afternoon, and for some ridiculous reason he says it would be best for me to leave her right there in the box until he gets home.

I can't imagine what would make him say a thing like that.

Yeah, well, yes I can. After all, I'm the one who baptized Della the Demon Possessed Laptop in the Coffee River. I'm also the one who likes to go off a-googling and expose her to super viruses strong enough to penetrate that wall we pay for. And then there's the whole double click thing.

clickclick

That's why he doesn't trust me with a schmancy Mac Daddy. If I'm going to kill computers, they might as well be the disposable kind. That's also why it's prudent to wait for him to be home before I get my hands on new Dellie.

In the meantime, I will continue to use old Della, but to be honest, I'm using her as little as possible. Frankly, my blood pressure and her whirly swirly circlet do not get along. That's one thing that has been keeping me away. It was either step away from the computer or toss her out the window, and I really didn't feel like replacing my window.

I've also been struggling with those UFOs I've yakked about HERE . I moped around whining about them for about a week and finally declared war with strict diet, exercise, and some creative body bracing. I do believe I'm starting to feel some better. I hope so. After all, what's the fun of having a new Dellie if you are too achy to use her?

That's all I have for now.

I know that many of you hate it when I turn off comments because you love to tell me so. I'm doing it anyway. I'm sort of bratty like that.

I'll be back to share my Sand Pail List for the summer of 2013. It's a lot like my Sand Pail List of 2012... only not.

Yakking all about myself...

Seriously talkative Christian mom who is blessed enough to be married to her favorite friend. We have two nearly grown daughters, one practical--and one whimsical. Together, they have filled our home with the perfect balance of practical whimsy.